


delight in smallness

by raijuthehyeju



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Communication, Enemies to Friends, Episode Tag, Episode: s01e03 Context is for Kings, Episode: s01e04 The Butcher's Knife Cares Not for the Lamb's Cry, Gen, Memories, Mild Gore, Missing Scene, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-05
Updated: 2019-04-05
Packaged: 2020-01-05 05:04:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18359177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raijuthehyeju/pseuds/raijuthehyeju
Summary: Old ghosts appear where you least expect them to.Much less when you're the not-even-month-long, recently-promoted Lieutenant navigator to the new starship Discovery, and you see the face of someone you'd never thought you'd see again.





	delight in smallness

**Author's Note:**

> "detmer told me you'd survived" AKA michael and keyla are FRIENDS from and after shenzhou || slight headcanon'ing that, since keyla was a jr. lieutenant during the shenzhou era, she got promoted and then immediately drafted to go navigate discovery so she's like only been there a month or less || love to project processing my own mental trauma/processing on my fav side characters || gore tag for some graphic descriptions of injuries || i apologize for any shitty medical talk/science i am small and gay and an artist i do not know how to science so i try || @raijuthehyeju on twitter || thanks and god bless

_Burnham was still here_ , Lieutenant Keyla Detmer's thoughts pounded.

Burnham was still here, on the ship, when she should have left yesterday on a prison shuttle.

But here she was now, at her side in the secondary science lab, while Keyla filed in new navigational reports concerning her coordinates programming and how the mycelial network worked in tandem with it.

And they’d worked like that in silence for about twenty minutes so far.

One thing that was good about Burnham was that she knew how to shut up. Shut up and just work. Because ‘shut up and work’ was a much more preferred method of interaction rather than the pathetic deer-in-headlights expression she’d given Burnham in the Mess Hall when she first saw her fo _rmer Commander_ the mutineer onboard Discovery.

Initially, it was shock. Confusion, later- much later. Anger after a shower. But it was the shock that overwhelmed Keyla and make her not even remember what she had to eat that day. Because now, barely six months later (four months after her release from the hospital), there was someone else who survived from the Shenzhou onboard Discovery. With her. With Commander Saru. The shock of knowing someone who was there, what it was like, someone maybe she could talk to and not just get gawked at as a veteran of the binaries, but--

It was Michael. Michael ‘started the Klingon War’ Burnham.  
A sentiment that, admittedly, after being there for yourself, always seemed a little wrong, to say the _least._

But Keyla had her reasons. Reasons that she wasn’t really keen on delving into at the moment, no matter how ferociously they bubbled underneath the lid of her own self-control.

So the two filed their findings on how mycelial network jumps varied with the tardigrade versus Stamets’ initial predictions and smaller jumps- Michael covering the science division end of it, and Detmer covering the Operations/Navigational side.

It worked, for a while.  
Until Burnham ran into an <ERROR> on her console that made her tilt her head and review through the code, scrolling to see what could possibly be wrong.

Detmer and her eye caught the sight of it; she snapped an image of a subsection of molecular structure from the tardigrade’s brain and Discovery’s processor, realizing that Burnham had not yet imported Stamets’ scannings yet for comparison’s sake.

Not really Burnham’s fault, however; Discovery’s UI was so new that sometimes their import/export functions could be a little _too_ hidden.

So, she shut her eyes, steeled herself to speak, and opened her mouth.

“Right there,” Keyla told Burnham across the console, commanding her implant to forward the image capture she’d taken to Michael’s screen. “That’s what’s causing it. Also, you gotta manually import it at the top; this ship’s interface doesn’t do it right away sometimes.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Keyla _did_ see Burnham look, at least, a _little_ surprised at hearing her speak so much.

This was, after all, the most they’d spoken since Michael had come aboard after their sighting in Mess Hall.

“Thank you.”

A curt nod said all there was to say.  
_There used to be a day when she’d be happy about collaborating with Burnham.  
_ _But she could be, couldn’t she?_

No. Not anymore.

“Lieutenant Detmer?”  
Keyla didn’t know what to say, so she let silence be her ward.  
“Lieutenant Detmer,” Michael repeated.  
Her eyes remained glued to the console screen.  
“Talk to me.” Michael asked. “...Please.”

Keyla felt her lips tighten. “What’s there to talk about, Specialist.”

Burnham was silent, Detmer’s gaze still fixed on the science console as the specialist held her position.

“...I didn’t get a chance to see who survivors were from the Shenzhou before I went to be court martialed. Furthermore, I did not expect to see both you _and_ Saru when I came aboard, Lieutenant. And...”

“‘And?’”

Burnham primed herself to speak again. “It relieves me you both are here.”

“Yeah,” Keyla snapped in quiet restrain, hitting the touchpad with a little more force than she expected. “Yeah, I’m here. Sure. In one stitched up, put-back-together-again piece, mostly, but I’m here. And so is Saru. And now you _too,_ apparently.”  
Michael took a step closer. “Keyla, I am _just--_ ”

“Don’t ‘Keyla’ me--” she retorted with a force that she surprised herself with as the Lieutenant’s teeth ground together. “Don’t. You don’t get to do that. Not now.”

Her frustration was smoldering like some silent, unkempt fire, Detmer shutting her eyes as she closed out of her working window and looked Burnham directly. “Let me tell you something, Burnham, and I want you to listen _real_ carefully, because I can _tell_ you haven’t had to hear it from anyone from the Shenzhou yet. ...Do you know what it was like?” she started, turning to give an accusatory glare towards the Specialist. “Having to-- ‘wait your turn’ while a medical drone makes sure your head doesn’t split open because there’s _dozens_ of Starfleet medical officers trying to save _other_ peoples’ lives? People who actually _deserve_ it? Feel your… _eye_ hang from the stem as you start to lose sight? Lying on a gurney? Getting told that your _brain_ will deteriorate unless you get _this_ in?!”

Keyla’s heart broke and burned in its rubble-soaked anger as she bore a stare into Burnham’s face, her throat hurting from the lump wedged into it that rivaled the volume she spoke at.

“...No,” Michael finally admitted, “no. I don’t.”    
“My family didn’t even have enough time to fly in for the operation,” Detmer started again, “they had to meet me at a Starbase while I did _physical therapy_ , while I _woke up_ , when they _drafted_ me for Discovery because they knew _I_ knew how to pilot, and--”

The Lieutenant stopped herself, white-knuckled releasing when she felt her own nails begin to dig into the palm of her hand. “No. You don’t. You don’t know any of this. You got to go to prison and hide away from _all_ this shit while we were left with the fallout, Burnham. You, I’m…”

Keyla felt her throat threatening to tighten even further, straightening her posture as she looked back to the Specialist, with grief making its presence known.  
Because when she looked at the face of Michael Burnham, it was the face of someone she’d known before everything changed.  
Before _she_ changed, both inside and out, forever.

_Before, when there could be laughter and joy and wonder on a starship bridge._

“I didn’t even get to fly her for _two years_. Was the Shenzhou, was _Georgiou…_ were we _really_ that easy to mutiny against?”

Burnham, to her credit, gave a damned good stony face despite looking like she was about to lose it.

“I can… see that I have upset you, Lieutenant Detmer,” Michael began, “and for that, I apologize. I can… I _will_ leave you, now. And I will do my best to keep a professional distance with you, should my presence ever be needed on the bridge.”

And Michael Burnham, quickly, turned a heel and walked to exit the science room, leaving Keyla Detmer to stew in the silence of nothing but Discovery’s UI chimes and the ever-present hum of the warp engines.

Well? Did she feel better? How did that feel, Keyla asked herself?  
Fine. Burnham deserved it. Needed a wakeup call as to how many people she actually impacted, anyway.  
Did she really herself impact them directly, though?  
How many people onboard the _Shenzhou_ were impacted.  
But did she, _Lieutenant Keyla Detmer_ , feel better?  
She should have.  
Then why, oh why was the lump in the middle of her throat still there, and her right eye beginning to sting and grow bleary?

No, stupid question. She knew exactly why.

Because for all the trauma- for all the hardship, all the awful memories of recuperation, of surgery, of dermal care and reconstructing a face Keyla was only _now_ beginning to recognize as her own again… there were the good times.

The good times of sweet, crisp amazement at new worlds they were discovering, together, as a bridge and as a crew, on the Shenzhou, an entire bridge silenced by the wonders of the universe. The good times of discovery. The good times of away missions, camping out under the stars, or piloting one of the shuttle crafts through some godforsaken asteroid field. The good times of hearing Captain Georgiou making some playful remark to Science Officer Saru. The good times of listening to Commander Burnham offer advice in that steely Vulcan tone that grew softer, more human, every day.

And she was alive.    
So was Saru.  
They all were alive.  
But Georgiou was dead.  
So many were dead.

And a version of her, Keyla Detmer, was dead alongside them, too.

That tug-of-war was the final pull that brought a tear down onto the touchpad glass of her science console.  
And an unbearable weight settled in on Lieutenant Keyla Detmer’s chest, unable to handle the grief that flooded her mind and clouded her vision with all tears, heartache: and now, regret.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 A couple day cycles had passed since her confrontation with Burnham, and Lieutenant Keyla Detmer _still_ managed to feel like shit.

It was starting to show in her work, too; and if that wasn’t enough convincing to finally stop sidestepping around the issue, then it would be the constant nagging Keyla was feeling in the pit of her gut. It was hard falling asleep, her coordinate entries had a few log inconsistency errors, the implant side of her skull was giving her headaches that required a stop to sickbay for an aspirin hypospray, and she’d even snapped for some trivial little thing at her fellow Lieutenant Owosekun on the bridge (which was _not_ helping her guilt levels in the slightest). That snap was why she was now sitting by herself, the rest of the bridge having witnessed her mood, the Lieutenant taking a self-imposed break and absently stirring a warm London Fog.

The quiet of a single Lieutenant’s quarters wasn’t much relief.

So the white noise of the Mess Hall would have to do.  

She sat there for a while, happy to bask in the silence while her bone conduction played a soft little house album, when Michael Burnham herself proceeded into Mess Hall. Detmer’s eyes widened and she was knocked out of her meditative trance, willing her music to pause as she watched the woman grab a simple tray of a midday snack, heading the opposite way once her plate materialized and tray was in hand...

This was it.  
Now or never.

“B-burnham,” Keyla called, straightening her posture as she noticed Michael stop. She watched the woman turn, Burnham tilting her head as if to verify she actually A), heard that, and B), ensure that it was coming out of _her_ mouth. A nod to the empty chair across from her and returned gaze from Detmer confirmed it for the Specialist and, although wary, Michael approached the open seat across from Keyla, unable to break eye contact (in what was either a stare of trepidation, or simply an old habit that died hard).

“Thanks,” Michael said simply, stirring a cup of (what looked to be) yogurt and granola.  
“Don’t mention it,” Detmer told her.

Quiet hung between then for a moment.

“Replicators are nice here, aren’t they,” Keyla offered. “Though the Shenzhou’s made better baked goods, I think.”  
Michael’s eyes looked up from her tray, the beginnings of a smile kept smothered under a cautious glance. “I only noticed the new transporters. But that’s just me.”  
“Have a bagel or something and tell me what you think.”

Two grins went unexchanged.

Keyla’s thin hands gripped around the sides of her mug.

“Do you know anyone else who survived?” Michael suddenly asked, causing Keyla’s mouth to hang open some before catching her composure.  
She swallowed. “You haven’t looked it up in Starfleet records yet?”  
“Haven’t been given clearance yet in the ship’s archives.”  
Keyla wrapped her lips in. “Not at lot. From the bridge- you, me, Saru, Lieutenant Gant--”  
“Really?”  
“Yeah,” Detmer offered with a sigh, “we were in the same hospital wing together when I got out of ICU. Dropped off the map after he left, though. Haven’t talked to him since.”

Another silence hung between them.

Detmer’s fingers tapped at the London Fog.

“Look, Michael,” Keyla sighed, taking a swallow. “I owe you an apology. Not only just professionally, but personally. I acted completely, completely irrationally the other day, and I’m… I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. And cruel. I--”

“No,” Michael interrupted with, drawing Keyla’s gaze up from the coffee mug to look at her. “No, I understand why. What you went through was far more traumatic than I will ever be able to imagine, and you had not seen another member of the crew, other than Saru, since the Battle. I am sorry. And I apologize if my unannounced arrival was in any way triggering to you. You have been through more than I could ever imagine, and I cannot fathom the depths of what different sides of the war we’ve lived on since that day.”

Keyla didn’t allow herself to debate that point. She couldn’t, because Michael was right. Memories, every day, threatened to creep back from the dark pits of her mind; moreso now after being immediately drafted to pilot Discovery. Memories of the white-noise whir of the medical drone’s dermal regenerator holding the skin of her face together, a Junior Lieutenant trying to keep her left hand from shaking covered in her own blood as she saw the vision in her eye darken and eventually fade into nothingness, being unable to move the right side of her body as doctors wrangled with tricorders and hyposprays, Keyla drifting in and out of consciousness from both painkillers and shock, learning how long physical therapy would be and how deep the implant would root itself in her brain… but most (unbearably) of all, the Lieutenant remembered how small she felt. How small, despite just hours ago, she relished and delighted in that smallness, being a witness to the immensity of space on a massive ship that sailed amongst the stars in the name of exploration and knowledge.

Now, smallness was a fear. A problem to erase. It was weakness in a time of war.

And she wished for a day when she could delight in that smallness again- when she could simply be responsible for the trail of a warp signature, visible only as a twinkle in the skies from whatever planet was watching below.

“Yet, despite everything,” Michael ended, “my sentiment still stands. I am-- relieved… to see you alive. Happy, even.”

The beginnings of a smile wriggled in the corner of her lips.

“Do you miss it?” Michael asked. “The Shenzhou?”

_Every day._

Detmer’s smile widened with a gaze steeped in melancholy. “I don’t miss wrangling nav coordinates with those shitty transporters.”

And Michael Burnham couldn’t help but smile back.

“They really _were_ old, huh.”  
“Nice to know Starfleet was happy to abide us with ‘vintage’ energizer tech.”

“I didn’t get to tell you yet, but I _do_ like your haircut,” Michael told her, bringing a light chuckle out of the Navigator. “It’s very ‘you.’”  
“I actually used to have it cut like this when I was a teen,” Detmer admitted. “Nice to know it looks a lot better now that I’m an adult and have a sense of style.”  
“Really?”

“Pfft- a teen out in Düsseldorf with a pilot’s license and staying up to watch asteroid belt racing leagues?” she humored at the end of a laugh. “Besides: sickbay needs me to keep this side shaved for checkups anyway- follicle stimulators would just be annoying at this point.”

Burnham allowed her smile to compensate for silence.

“May I ask what it helps with?” Michael asked gently as she looked to her implant.

“Mostly neuron transmissions for actively-processing motor functions,” Keyla explained after a sip of her tea, “AKA, making sure I can _move_ the right side of my body. The metal bits compensate for the parts of my skull that were, uh- ‘removed,’ and some hearing, too; the middle rounded part near the ear is one of those bone conductors.” Her finger trailed along the implant as she explained, rimming under her bionic eye, “Half the socket, all under this was just… gone, it hit me so fast and with such force; apparently doctors had to get a little creative in the design of the implant, so it’s a custom piece~ my eye and stem deteriorated from exposure, sooo a synthetic transmitter runs to the brain, and there’s a part of the implant that helps visual processing. Can do a bit of augmented reality stuff, too, but it’s basic so I don’t have any telescopic vision problems since the other eye’s still organic. Video recording, image capture, universal translator language decoding, temperature fluctuation, photos, ship-wide alerts- that sorta thing.”  
Detmer shrugged playfully. “Downloaded some pretty neat filters the other day.”

That got a grin out of Michael before the smile faded.

“And may I ask what it was that did it?”  
“You mean ‘what happened?’”

By the looks of it, Michael could tell Keyla was used to that question, calling her out like that.  
At least Burnham had the courtesy of trying to word it differently.

So Keyla’s lower lip firmed. “The navigation console’s circuits had an electrical feedback. The charged electron gathering was so massive it just… blew apart in my face. Bad combo of superheated steel, console controls, and touchpad glass: meet Keyla Detmer’s head.”

“Mmm.”

Keyla watched Michael, if but for a fraction of a second, try to imagine the scene, fitting the pieces of Keyla’s physical evidence and verbal recounting together.  
She couldn’t.  
Which, to be fair, not a lot of people could.  
For it was hardly a pleasant imagination.

So Burnham allowed her grin to return. “...Congratulations on your promotion from Junior Lieutenant, by the way.”  
“And congrats to _you_ on being able to get out of prison.”

Michael’s grin now spread fully into a smile.

“I missed you, Detmer,” she admitted in a soft voice. “When I said I was glad to see you and Saru onboard Discovery… I meant it. You were the best navigator the Shenzhou had in the seven years I served her. You were a great shipmate, colleague, and a--”

Michael had to pause, Keyla watching her signature ‘processing emotions’ face as she decided on her words. “...A friend.”

“Beat you in Kadis-kot enough times to get you and Saru into debt to me,” Keyla boasted in a gentle tone, her eyes scanning the specialist as she seemed to relax in her seat. “But I’m glad to see you too, Burnham. And _I_ mean it. I’m sorry I was ru-- no, nope, calling it what I was- a jerk. A dick, even. Veterans… we gotta stick together, right?”  
“Right.”  
“So,” Keyla began, moving her arm closer to the middle of the table with a hand open for a shake or a hold, “do-over?”

She watched Michael look to the hand, glancing back up at Keyla- maybe trying to decide if this was a ruse, a social obligation, a contract… but the look of hyper-analyzation eventually left, replaced by the beautiful smile of Michael Burnham as she took her hand and gripped it with an affirming tenderness. “Do-over.”

“Lieutenant Keyla Detmer- navigator for the USS Discovery. Pleased to be your shipmate. ...Again.”  
“Specialist Michael Burnham to the USS Discovery. Pleased to, again, be your shipmate.”

And it felt so, so beautiful to be able to feel _love_ and _kinship_ blossom in the soil of her heart, despite the cruel storms of war overhead.

“If you want,” Keyla offered, letting go of Michael’s hand and bringing it back to her side of the table, “there's a movie night on Thursday at 1700 hours with the bridge crew. Haven't gone yet myself, though. Oh, and I’ll add you in a group chat we’ve got. You're roommates with Cadet Tilly, right? Yeah, she's in there, she's good-”  
“Will tha--”  
“I’ll put in a good word for you, don’t worry,” Keyla promised. “The most it can be is poking fun of Lorca or Commander Stamets.”  
“He seems like a bit of a wisecracker.”  
“Who- Lorca or Stamets?”  
“Lorca’s wisecracks aren’t so… _wise,_ I’d say,” Michael allowed herself to poke, “just cracks.”  
Keyla smirked. “I’ve known him for less than a month and you’re absolutely right.”  
“Are you sure, though? You know I was never the best at responding to the Shenzhou’s group chat, and--”  
“Hey. We all need fresh starts every now and then, don’t we?”

Michael nodded. “I suppose we do. Now tell me; that Conn-Ops Lieutenant across from you... who is she?”


End file.
